Scariest Chart Ever, Surpassing 100% Debt To GDP

Earlier today we presented Bloomberg’s Chart of the Day which represented the GDP and Debt per capita on a historical and projected basis, and we hysterically, and tongue-in-cheekly, dubbed it “the scariest chart ever” because it confirmed that at some point, very soon, US Debt will surpass GDP and never look back. We decided to dig into the actual numbers (cancelling out the per capital denominator as it is the same on both sides of the equation) and came to a very disturbing revelation: as of today, total US Debt, is $14.942 trillion (source), obviously an all time high. Q2 GDP as was reported by the BEA three weeks ago, was $15.012 trillion in current dollars. In other words, the spread between total GDP and total debt has now collapsed to an all time low $70 billion. Incidentally, this number was $1.8 trillion at the beginning of 2010. Then we decided to take a quick look at the upcoming bond issuance and find that tomorrow the Treasury will announce approximately $99 billion in 2, 5 and 7 Year bonds to be auctioned off October 25 through 27… With a very appropriate settlement date: October 31, elsewhere known as Halloween. Yes, ladies and gentlemen: All Hallows E’en will be doubly scary this year: for the first time since World War II, US debt will officially surpass GDP on Halloween 2011.